Memoirs of Vidocq : master of crime / François Eugène Vidocq.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Vidocq, Eugène François, 1775-1857.

Series:

Nabat series ; 4.

Nabat series ; 4

Standardized Title:

Mémoires de Vidocq. English

Language:

English

French

Subjects (All):

Vidocq, Eugène François, 1775-1857.

Vidocq, Eugène François.

Detectives--France--Biography.

Detectives.

Police--France--Biography.

Police.

France.

Genre:

Biographies.

Autobiographies.

Physical Description:

xvii, 370 pages ; 23 cm.

Edition:

First Nabat edition.

Place of Publication:

Edinburgh, Scotland ; Oakland, CA : AK Press/Nabat, 2003.

Summary:

Aside from a fortune-telling midwife, few would have guessed that Eugene Francois Vidocq was born for greatness. From unpromising origins as a two-bit thief, army deserter, grifter, and convict, he rose to become the celebrated chief of the Paris Surete de police and an internationally renowned private detective. Vidocq is one of the most seminal, fantastic and pleasingly ambiguous historical figures you could ever hope to encounter. Balzac, Dumas and Victor Hugo freely borrowed from his stories for their novels. His life influenced the early crime fiction of Conan Doyle and Poe, and forever shaped both the crime novel and our notions of crime in general. Among his admirers, Vidocq was the first detective, a man of action, master of disguise, expert investigator, and champion of security and order, the kind of detective who "always gets his man." Among his detractors, Vidocq was and always remained a scoundrel and criminal, a con man who emerged from the underworld milieu to become the kind of corrupt detective for whom dissimulation, extortion and graft are tools of the trade. Both are false distinctions, for in Vidocq the criminal and detective are one. He was the world's first anti-hero rogue cop.

Contents:

"Vidocq, Rogue Cop" xi

I I Begin to Show Promise 1

II I Meet Adversity in Life and Love 18

III My Colours Are False 29

IV I Encounter Thieves and Forgers 42

V I See Much of Prison Cells 53

VI Escapes Are In Vain 68

VII To The Hulks At Brest 81

VIII I Conceal My Identity 92

IX Adepts And Cutthroats 116

X A Nest of Land Pirates 126

XI I Aid My Old Enemies 136

XII A Peace of Mind Soon Lost 143

XIII Good Intentions Come to Naught 151

XIV The Villainous Past Preys Upon Me 160

XV A Fugitive Once More 172

XVI My Debut with the Police 184

XVII Victims of My Craft 192

XVIII The Nature of My Craft 204

XIX I Lodge with the Enemy 217

XX The Clue of the Yellow Curtains 226

XXI I Avoid Snares 238

XXII My Renown Increases 250

XXIII The Clue of the Two Footprints 264

XXIV I Escape Being Swallowed Up 277

XXV Our Friends the Enemy 289

XXVI Important Captures 299

XXVII The Clue of a Scrap of Paper 315

XXVIII A Hercules and a Brigand 328

XXIX Thieves and Robbers 341.

Notes:

Translation of Mémoires.

Reprint of the 1935 ed. translated and edited by Edwin Gile Rich.

ISBN:

1902593715

OCLC:

52690231